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Thursday, 8 September 2011

Turquoise top

So, apart from the Geometric refashion, I did actually manage to make an item of clothing for me, during the summer holidays.

For the second week of the summer holidays my m-i-l took my girls to Norfolk for a week, which enabled Husband and I to go to Liverpool for a few days. Lots of walking, eating, galleries, shopping, mixed weather - we had a great time!

The afternoon and evening before we left, I concentrated on cutting out my new top. I was using one of the fabrics I bought at the fantastic Goldhawk Road Fabric Fandango and one of the patterns Husband gave me for my birthday. I have had many ideas for the various pieces of material I bought, some of which was quite conflicting, so it felt really good to actually cut into some of it.

The pattern was Simplicity 2255:

I had looked at this pattern several times but not really made a decision on it until I saw a post from Jorth on this top. Her shirt looked so professional I decided that it was a pattern I wanted to have a go at after all. I have a sleeveless shirt from Boden that I've had for years, which I love but is on it last legs, and it is difficult to tuck in due to a ruffle all the way down the front. So I decided to go for view D (not completely sleeveless) with the small half ruffle thing from view C.The fabric is 100% cotton, quite fine with a loose-ish weave, which for parts of it was a complete nightmare. For example, the front ruffle needed a narrow hem, which seemed simple enough, however, my sewing machine had other ideas. After chewing up the hem, I managed to unpick the stitching without any damage to the fabric. I repinned the hem and found some tissue paper, so tried stitching the hem with the tissue, which worked really well, although tearing away the tissue was a bit fiddly.

As Jorth mentioned in her post, whilst labeled 'easy to sew', it is fiddly. My iron and I became firm friends during this make as I wanted to make this look as good as possible. I used french seams on the inside. The whole shirt took a while to make, an hour here, couple of hours there. I was, however, determined to finish the shirt in time for Eldest's birthday treat. The last thing to do were the buttonholes, which I have to admit, I'd put off the previous evening. They weren't so bad after all and I was able to wear it the next day.

The picture I have of me wearing it isn't great, taken on my phone in a poorly lit room:Note for another make: I made a size 10, which is mostly ok, but I need to grade out to a larger size in the hip if I make one of the longer versions. If I had put the last buttonhole in I would not be able to do it up, so I didn't bother. I think I probably need to take out some of the width in the front shoulder area - there seemed to be a fairly constant fold of excess material.